The NoPhone

This Brief

NoPhone started with a simple observation: everyone was on their phone. Like a lot. Like a lot a lot. At dinner, on dates, out with friends… screens everywhere.

Our CEO Ingmar Larsen, co-creator of the NoPhone, decided to fight fire with fire. Or rather, fight smartphone addition with not-quite smartphones. The NoPhone is a technology-free alternative to constant hand-to-phone contact: a phone-shaped piece of plastic that does absolutely nothing. No apps. No battery. No notifications. Just the comforting weight of a rectangle in your pocket, keeping you connected to the real world.

That’s right. The NoPhone is completely useless. Sort of.

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This Approach

The product was the idea, and the idea was the whole campaign. We built the brand around the joke that wasn't entirely a joke. The problem that it was poking fun at was (and still is) very real.

We launched the NoPhone on Kickstarter, leaning hard into the silliness of it all. The concept did its own talking and made its own news. To this day, still our way of doing things. The NoPhone sold itself by being exactly what it claimed to be: completely useless, completely self-aware, and impossible to ignore. 

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This Result

The Kickstarter raised $18,316, well over its goal. The NoPhone was pitched on Shark Tank and presented at TEDx. News reporters had no clue what to make of the idea, which meant they couldn’t stop talking about it.

15,000 NoPhones shipped worldwide, and continuing to ship now over a decade later. Features in The New York Times, Fast Company, The Washington Post, TechCrunch, The Huffington Post, and dozens more. A downgraded version, the NoPhone Zero, was later released and named the Most Useless Gadget of All Time.

We've never been prouder. 

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